


Hunting The Hunter

by cuddlepuss



Category: Bobby Singer - Fandom, Castiel - Fandom, Dean Winchester - Fandom, Ellen Harvelle - Fandom, Sam Winchester - Fandom, Supernatural
Genre: Arson, Character Death, Demons, Kidnapping, Knife Throwing, Multi, Murder
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-17
Updated: 2014-05-17
Packaged: 2018-01-25 10:57:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1646168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cuddlepuss/pseuds/cuddlepuss
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three part story of how an adopted female hunter tracks down her birth mother, learns the devastating truth of her parentage and then hunts down the demon that kidnaps her Mum and half Brother.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> All but two of the OC's belong to DeviantArt's Fallen-Eternal, my husband.
> 
> The one, Yellow eyed demon, belongs to me, Cuddlepuss.
> 
> Written in collaboration with Hubby as he claims I'm a better writer than him, and he wanted the back-story of the main character, Vyvyan Watts, to be told, as does the deceased hunter, Lauren.
> 
> Bonus points to anyone that realised the 'deceased hunter', Lauren, is named after the actress that plays the occasional part of Bella.

The bell over the café door clanged loudly, announcing her arrival and scraping on her already frayed nerves. Muttering to herself, the tall, svelte red head strode up to the counter, impatience in every line of her stiffly held body. While she was ordering – burger with salad and fries, coffee and cherry pie – the song playing quietly on the radio in the background, hits from the Musicals, begins ‘Where Is Love?’ From Oliver, and, irritated as she already was, She snarked to herself _”You and me both love”_ , scowling darkly.

Another customer, from the other side of the diner, called out _”Hey, Alex, can I get some more grits over here? Thanks.”_ ‘Alex’, acknowledging the request, smiled at her, asking what was up. Shrugging, the red head, Vyvyan, sighed and replied in a weary voice that she was pissed off with hunting people that didn’t want finding and things that should never have been. Nodding, Alex appeared unsurprised by her statement – she guessed you heard all sorts in the café.

Taking a seat at a table against a wall, Vyvyan got out her laptop and logged in to a map, clearly she was tracking someone or something, small dots of colour marked various points all across several states. When Alex brought over her coffee and burger, she pushed the laptop to one side, running a hand through her claret coloured hair, pushing it behind her ears and murmuring a quiet thanks.

Munching on her burger, fries and salad while checking and rechecking facts and details on her computer, Vyvyan scowled again and punched in more information, a new coloured dot appearing on the map, Vyvyan swore virulently under her breath. A cheerful male voice, from the table behind her, asked what was up. Turning, Vyvyan was struck by the fact that the young man’s hair, cropped to ear length, almost mirrored her own in colour and waviness, this combined with a similarity in face and build had her wondering. 

Just then Alex, the café server, came over to speak to his ‘boss’ about something. Vyvyan had barely noticed the name of the café when she’d come in, now she took note of the ‘Myles To Go’ logo on the menu and service boards. Things clicking into place, she asked her table neighbour if he was the ‘Myles’ in question. Nodding, he replied that he was, Robert Myles, at her service.

Tilting her head to one side, Vyvyan asked if he knew a Sy Newton. He looked at her oddly, then asked why she was asking after his mum. Floundering, Vyvyan held her hand out, and said _”Hello little brother, she’s my mother too and I’ve been looking for her for thirteen years.”_ Slipping his cell phone out of his pocket, he made a call, saying that there was a young woman at the café that ‘she’ might like to meet.

Ten minutes later, an older version of Vyvyan rushed through the door, excitement in her face as she envisioned meeting her son’s lady friend for the first time, and she’d been waiting for years for that moment. No doubting who the woman was, it was like looking in an age reducing mirror, her own red hair now sprinkled with silver and fine lines appearing on her face, she stopped dead in her tracks as she took in the sight of her son and daughter together.

Vyvyan, seeing her mother for the first time that she could remember, got to her feet, a sneer on her face. _”Mother, dearest, so good to see you after all this time. How have you been? Where have you been? I’ve been looking for you for so long.”_ Her mother, Sy, bit her lip and glanced at her son, then around the café, in fact, anywhere but at Vyvyan. 

_”It’s ….complicated. How did you find me? Why did you find me? What do you want of me?”_ Vyvyan snarled at her _”WHAT’S complicated mother? Why toss me away as if I was so much unwanted trash? Was I illegitimate? Your bastard you needed to hide? What was so wrong with me you had to get rid of me, but could keep him? *pointing to Robert*. Didn’t you care at all what would happen to me?”_

Robert’s head was swivelling back and forth as if watching a tennis match, his mouth open and his black and red streaked beard brushing his chest. Sy picked up the proverbial ball, and tossed it back with an angry _”I was young, I was a hunter, I never wanted you in danger from the things that I go after. You were adopted, you had a good family, a stable home life, something I could never offer you. I did what I thought was best.”_

Vyvyan opened her mouth to retort but was cut off by Robert suddenly snapping back with it and insisting they take their family squabble upstairs to his flat, where they could have a drink and sort it out without putting the customers off their food. With an abrupt nod, Vyvyan stalked out the door, Sy close behind. Robert, taking a moment to put Alex in charge, follows on behind, dreading what skeletons would emerge from his mother’s secret family closet. 

As soon as they were in the safe confines of his apartment, his mother and newly discovered sister let fly the verbal darts at each other, both scoring direct hits, both feeling the pain the other shot at them. Vyvyan, still incredulous at her birth mother’s behaviour, decried in a strident voice the murder of her adoptive parents and siblings, by demons claiming to be ‘gaining retribution’ on her (Vyvyan’s) family. She’d not understood what they meant until that afternoon. 

In a cold, monotone voice, devoid of emotion, Vyvyan retold the events of September 26 th, 1986, her very lack of emotion emphasizing the horror of the day. _”You know, it never occurred to me that we, none of us, had anything in common with one another. Not hair or eye colour, shape, personality or anything. I didn’t even think about it. It was only when I was 16 that mum and dad told the three of us why that was. We hadn’t known until then that we were adopted, why would we?”_

She paused, taking a sip of the coffee her half-brother had supplied. _”Looking back, that’s when it all started going wrong. They were overheard – by demons. Demons in the employ of Azazel, a yellow eyed demon, and he sought us out later that night. I was forced to watch as mum, dad, and my two brothers were tortured and murdered in front of me, pleading for death, for it to stop. Asking why this was being done to them. Do you have any idea, mother, of how it feels to watch the people you love, your family, shredded without mercy, the man doing it laughing all the while, and you’re helpless to stop it? Do you? When he was done, and two men had arrived and salted and burned the bodies to prevent them coming back as vengeful spirits, I swore on their graves that I’d find and kill the sonofabitch that had done it. And I won’t rest until I have.”_

At this, Sy’s face paled, her hands started to tremble and she gave a noticeable shiver. Robert, noticing this, wrapped an arm around her shoulders, as Sy began to talk in a muted near whisper _”Oh god. HIM. I…I…I thought you’d be free of him, as would I, if I had you adopted out. He…he’s the ‘man’ that raped me, multiple times, over the space of the week he held me captive. I almost aborted you, but couldn’t bring myself to kill a baby, so I thought adoption was ideal, for us both.”_

By the time she’d finished speaking, Sy was in tears, and trembles wracked her body wildly. A phone ringing broke the sound of sobbing and eased the tension. Answering it, Vyvyan swore virulently for a few minutes, agreed tersely, and hung up. Looking up, Vyvyan said _”Look, I gotta go. That was news of a friend’s death, I promised to make a delivery to another friend for them a couple states over, and it can’t wait. Family business kind of urgent, you understand. I’ll come back when it’s done, and we can talk again.”_

As she went out and climbed into her fifteen year old small campervan, Vyvyan was thinking about not just what she’d learned of her parentage, but of the job she now had to do for her late friend and fellow hunter, Lauren Cohen. She and Lauren had been buddies in the circus, before she’d left to hunt down the bastard that had killed her family. 

As she’d driven the day’s trip to pick up the delivery, she reminisced over their days in the circus together, how she’d nearly landed a knife in the acrobat’s balance ball the first time they’d met. A rueful smile tugged at her lips as she arrived, some five hours later, tired, and stressed, but glad to be away from her newly discovered family for a while. Lauren’s sister met her at the door and invited her inside to stay the night.

Next morning, bright and early, Vyvyan loaded the medium sized, steel and iron chest into the back of her camper with the help of Lauren’s sister, then left on the two day trip to get to Sioux Falls. On the journey, she sent a message to Bobby to warn him she was underway, and that she’d be with him in a couple days. A reply said he’d be waiting, he knew what her coming meant.

When she arrived, almost five in the afternoon, two days later, his door opened almost before she’d stopped, and a semi-familiar young man stepped out into view. Putting the engine, thankfully, into park, she climbed tiredly out and stretched, Bobby appearing at the door minutes later, another semi-familiar male with him. Coming toward Bobby with a weary _”Who’re these two idjits, Bobby?”_ a small smile etched briefly across her face.

The entire trip she’d been thinking, alternating between what Lauren’s death will mean, and the new knowledge about her blood family. It’d been a long hard drive, and she’d had about as much as she could take. Bobby, clapping a hand on her shoulder, led her toward the house, murmuring sympathy for the loss of their mutual friend. Vyvyan briefly leant her head on Bobby’s chest as he made coffee and they talked.

With a grin, Bobby offered to make something to eat while she ‘borrowed’ the young men to help with the delivery she had come to make. A rueful head shake from one, and an indignant squawk rose from the other, the volunteers, and Vyvyan led them back to her camper, their muscles would come in handy for lifting that chest.

Once the chest was inside and safely stowed away, Garth and Ash started to ask questions about it, Vyvyan and Bobby stayed quiet. Soon enough the answers to all the mysteries of the chest would be revealed. Until then, she had some thinking and grieving to do. Bobby, noticing her distraction, asked about what was up, it obviously being more than Lauren’s passing.

Vyvyan, unsure of the wisdom of confiding in anyone, made a snap decision to trust Bobby with the whole truth, and wound up spewing it out, like a volcanic geyser under pressure. The outpouring of words lasted through dinner and over whiskey and coffee too. When she was all talked out, Bobby, having been chewing over his thoughts as he listened, said it sounded like the work of the same demon a family of hunting friends of his was seeking. It had killed the wife / mother when the younger boy was just six months old, and they’d been after it ever since.

Interested despite herself, Vyvyan asked the name of the family, and was shocked to find it the Winchesters. She’d heard of them in hunting circles, of course, but more than that, she vaguely remembered that as being the name of the two young men that helped her when her adopted family was murdered. Describing what she could remember of the classic black car and two men, she was stunned to learn that it was none other than Sam and Dean Winchester themselves that had helped her all those years before.

Bobby went into his lockup, into his safe, and brought out a letter addressed to Vyvyan, in Lauren’s handwriting, and gave it to her. Opening it, after taking a deep breath, Vyvyan read the last thing that her friend was ever to communicate to her.

_Dear Vyvyan,  
By the time you get this, I’ll be dead, and you will have kept your promise to deliver that chest to Bobby. Now for the important part. You need to get hold of three beings, Ellen Harvelle, Dean Winchester, and Castiel Novak. To each you must pass the message ‘Angels and Demons, odds evens.’ Within two days, they should be with you at Bobby’s yard. They are the trustees of the keys to the chest, and each knows what they must do next. _

_As for you, my friend, I leave to you the contents of my cabin at Lawrence, the Winchester boys can guide you to it. There’s just one more thing you need to know, and it’s this, the yellow eyed demon that killed your family has plans for you and Sam Winchester. I don’t know what they are, but don’t get too friendly with him – I have a feeling one of you will die in the process of finding out what it is._

_God speed to you all,  
Lauren._

Shocked, Vyvyan stumbled to a seat and sat on it, trembling. She’d suspected Lauren knew something she wasn’t letting on for a while now, there had to be some reason for the split up Lauren had initiated with her, that’s why Vyvyan had accepted, if resentfully, the decision Lauren had made not to actively hunt anymore, but to be more of a ‘go-to’ girl for information. Now she knew why. Bobby made the calls to Ellen and Dean, while Vyvyan herself prayed to Castiel. The chain of events that needed to happen had started.

Next day, Ellen arrived bringing a key to the chest, and did a strange ritual over it to enable Bobby to use it to open the first lock. Next, Castiel came with his key, chanted in Enochian over it and handed it to Bobby, the second lock opened easily. When the Winchester boys arrived in their Impala, well, that’s when the real fun began. Dean, again performing a spell over the key he had passed it to Bobby, and, cautiously, the third lock was undone.

When Bobby opened the lid of the chest, the first thing he found was a map of Lawrence, and instructions for Dean and Sam to take Vyvyan to a small cabin in the woods just outside the town, the one that Vyvyan had just inherited, where Vyvyan would find what she needed to locate her birth father and ‘deal with’ the family problem.

Beneath that was a set of old books, dusty old tomes about ancient runes, dead languages, and rituals for summoning / dispelling / and eradicating various kinds of would-be mythical beasts. It also contained some basic hoodoo spells, incantations and rituals. Bobby gave a rueful grin and once more delved into the chest. This time, in the very bottom of the chest, tightly secured with sigil bonded ribbons, was a small box, made of a rare kind of wood, and inlaid with iron and rock salt decals. This one bore the name ‘Winchester’ in blood on the side. Bobby handed this to Sam as he’d gasped when Bobby picked it up.

Sam’s arm hair stood on end as he took the small box from Bobby, his skin turning to goose bumps as a chill ran over him. Putting the box onto the table in front of him, he tugged gently on the ribbons to open them up, freeing the lid to be lifted. A sound like a quiet sigh echoed through the room as he raised the lid and put it to one side, his fingers tentative as he delved inside. In silence, he brought out a rolled paper – no, not paper, vellum, the ancient Egyptian papyrus equivalent of paper, the wax seal fragments still attached. 

A puzzled frown appeared on Dean’s face as he peered over Sam’s shoulder. _”What the hell kind of chicken scratch frickin mumbo-jumbo’s that!”_ he exclaimed, volubly. Sam, with a much less confused look on his face, explained to his brother, and everyone else, that it was Egyptian Hieroglyphics, like are on the walls of the pyramids and temples, from the times of the great Pharaohs. Dean scowled darkly, while Bobby shrugged and Sam exchanged a look with Cas.

Cas, moved to stand alongside Dean, at Sam’s other shoulder, translating the pictograms rapidly as Sam scrawled the translation onto a scrap of paper he’d dug out of his pocket. As Sam struggled to keep up with the rapid flow of words from the angel’s mouth, Vyvyan had her eyes closed and was listening, head down, focusing on what was being said, until one phrase caught her attention, and she called for him to stop, and repeat, slowly, what he’d just read. 

Eyes wide as Cas slowly repeated the paragraph of text he’d just translated, Vyvyan’s lips were moving in sync with the angel’s as she echoed him with a slightly different cadence and tone, giving the words a new meaning, and the others gathered round gazed at the two, stunned at the near immediacy of the re-translation given and it’s spin on the angel’s words. In a world where the right words can release or capture a demon, the subtle shift in meanings was not lost on the men and women gathered, only the angel seemed even slightly confused.

Glancing around at the assembled group, Vyvyan was unsurprised to see disbelief mingled with relief on the faces of most of them, respect was also there, with Cas, his head tilted, obviously re-running the words through his mind, searching for any other possible meanings. When no-one found any other meanings likely, they all, including Cas, started trying to work out what incantation the Hieroglyphs referred to. Bobby came up with one possibility, Sam with another.

Bobby had come across, in one of the books from the chest, an old spell for ‘purifying those once blood bound to hell’, while Sam, in a different book from the chest, came upon an incantation, and ritual, that would ‘remove from the body the taint of blood in the innocent’. Being that everything else Laurel had left pertained to the yellow eyed demon, Azazel, they all figured that it must mean that Vyvyan and Sy could be purified from his contamination – at least, that was the hope.

That was when Vyvyan suddenly smacked her hand onto her head, her face paling as a dreadful thought occurred. Snatching her phone from her pocket, she fumbled a number in her contacts and bit her lip as it rang and rang without answer. Desperately, she tried another number, with the same result. Panicking now, she flew up the stairs, out the door and jumped into her camper, screeching off, out of Bobby’s place, and off down the highway.

Cas suddenly popped up in the seat beside her, she tried to explain the cause of her panicked flight, and he popped off again, reappearing a few minutes later. Driving through without stopping, the drive that should have taken two days only took her one and a half, and when she arrived, a feeling of foreboding settled on her chest. The emergency services were swarming all over the smoking remains of her half-brothers café, and there was no sign of Robert or Sy to be found. When she asked an officer what had happened to her mother and half-brother, his face paled.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When she finds her Mother and Half Brother missing, she goes to the cabin she inherited and makes some discoveries that will change hers, and her Mothers lives, forever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Co-Author for this story was My Husband. He doesn't have an account on here, but over on DeviantArt, he's Fallen-Eternal.

Seeing the officer’s face paling, Vyvyan demanded, again, to know what had happened to her mother and half-brother. As she spoke to the officer, growing ever more concerned at his none answers, she didn’t notice Cas’s disappearance. The officer lead her over to a coroners van parked on the side of the ruined café’s parking area. Inside was a sealed body bag. Expecting the worst, Vyvyan took a deep breath and peered into the darkness of the bag when it was opened for her to try to identify the body.

Exhaling a relieved sigh, Vyvyan named the victim. It looked to be Alex, the counter server. Telling the officer what little she knew of him, then fell to her knees in relief. A warm hand was placed comfortingly onto her shoulder as she knelt there. Leaning her head onto it, and peering up, expecting to see Cas, she was startled to see a newly arrived Bobby, Cas just behind him, evidently having been zapped over by the angel.

She stumbled to her feet and made her way to a low wall, to sit on it as the realisation of their absence sunk in. A thought occurred, and she scrambled to her feet, beginning to search the surroundings and what she could see of the ruins. She wasn’t certain of what she was looking for, she only knew that she’d know it if she found it. Then she did.

The smell disguised beneath the stench of the fire, nevertheless, the residue of the sulphur was clear to see among the white and grey ashes of the burnt building and gravelled parking area. Looking again, she spotted other signs of demonic intervention. Here a sigil carved into the remains of a table, there, the bloody remains of one of the café’s table cloths. Odd signs that, if she’d not been looking for them, would have been easy to overlook.

Showing Cas and Bobby her findings, they agreed, but they all came to the same dismal conclusions.  
1) It WAS demonic intervention.  
2) Sy and Robert WEREN’T there.  
3) They had no clue of where they were.  
4) They had no clue of how to find out either.  
5) They didn’t know WHICH demon was responsible.

While Cas looked around some more, and Vyvyan sat thinking morbidly over the happenings of the last week, Bobby called Sam and Dean to fill them in on the latest developments. Conversing with them, it was decided that, if Vyvyan agreed, that Bobby would stay with her until the brothers could get there, as the café was nearer to the cabin than Bobby’s, the Winchesters would drive over, meet up with them, then Bobby would go home again (please Cas), and the brothers and Vyvyan would head off to her cabin. They didn’t want her alone at present in case the yellow eyed demon wanted her too.

In this Vyvyan agreed, the camper had two small beds in it, and Bobby could use one, while Vyvyan used the other. With Sam and Dean sharing the driving, they arrived just after mid-afternoon the second day, it having taken Vyvyan a day and a half to drive it alone. They had an early dinner in the town’s only other diner, then Cas took Bobby home and returned, while Vyvyan tried to settle the argument of who would share her camper for the night. Grinning in spite of the tense situation when Cas arrived back, Vyvyan claimed his arm, and chose HIM. Grumbling, the brothers acceded to the idea.

Next morning, the brothers were greeted by Vyvyan banging on the window of the impala where they’d slept, grinning and bearing coffee and breakfast. For Sam she has a filled wholemeal breakfast bun, for Dean she had breakfast pie (basically the same fillings in either a wholemeal roll, or a pie crust. The filling being sausage, egg, bacon and tomato). She and Cas had pancakes. While they all ate and planned the first leg of the journey, they scanned the passers-by to see if any darned demons were watching them.

They eventually settled on Sam taking the first day with Vyvyan while Cas, if he could spare the time, would ride with Dean, solidifying their ‘more profound bond’. Sam eagerly clambered aboard the small camper and flopped into the passenger seat, a smug look on his face as Dean looked at Vyvyan as if she were a bottle of ice water, and he was lost in the Sahara.

The mini caravan of vehicles set off, baby in front, precious following behind. As a gag, and a nod to one of her favourite story sets, Vyvyan had painted a golden ring on the bonnet / hood of the camper, Sam, seeing it, and knowing her name for the van, rolled his eyes, even as he drew a poor attempt at a sketch of Vyvyan as an elf. Looking across to him, and seeing what he was doing, she smiled a little, amused at his idea.

After a few hours on the road, they took a break again to get a drink, have a snack and do anything else you couldn’t do in a moving car. Dean asked Sam to take baby for a while so he could take a break, Cas then volunteered to ride with Vyvyan, frustrating Dean’s plans and making Sam laugh uproariously. Vyvyan just smiled a little and got back behind the wheel of her Precious.

When they next stopped, it was for the night, a roadside diner was their food-stop, and a nearby layby their motel. Deciding to be generous, Vyvyan let the lads use the beds in the camper, while she stretched out on the floor between and Cas sat up front. After a reasonable night’s sleep, they awoke to find Cas had been and collected something for breakfast as they slept. Hugging him, Vyvyan gratefully accepted the coffee and waffles he’d fetched her.

That day, Cas started the journey with Vyvyan, and the brothers rode together in baby. Dean was starting to get a little steamed. After taking an early lunch they set off again, this time with Dean in the camper and Cas and Sam in the impala. They arrived in Lawrence in the early evening, just in time to get a meal in a diner and grab a motel room for the men.

Next morning, when they were all actually awake and ready for action, they again went to the diner, talking about anything BUT why they were there while they ate. Dean, in full on flirt mode, kept up a constant stream of double entendre and insinuations, which were either ignored or laughed off by Vyvyan and laughed at by Sam, when he wasn’t rolling his eyes over it. Cas just tilted his head in that adorable confused puppy way of his.

When they got to the cabin, well concealed but easily found with the map and instructions left to them, they also got in easily as Lauren had left the keys in the envelope with Vyvyan’s letter, which she’d let them read in the motel the night before. Sam seemed shaken by the idea of him or Vyvyan dying in the course finding out about Azazel’s plans, and determined it should be him of the two of them, not that he let on to anyone how he felt about it. But Dean knew anyway.

Once inside, they spread out in the main room and each took an area to hunt through, trying to find what Lauren had thought would help track down the yellow eyed demon. Dean called out when he found a pendant with a charm on it, the charm looking to be a rune of some kind, Sam putting it aside to try to figure out later.

Scanning through books and papers, boxes of nick-nacks and odds and ends, There was a rapidly expanding cloud of dust rising, causing everyone to cough, and Vyvyan to go grab some of the beers that she’d stocked the campers mini fridge with, handing them round to the pleasure of the Winchesters. 

Having cleared, roughly, her area of the main room, Vyvyan went into the main bedroom, and started to scout around there, riffling through bags, boxes, and cupboards. Cas joined her, casting a spell on the room to stop their voices from being heard by anyone else, he asked Vyvyan what she felt about the idea that she or Sam may soon die in the attempt to find out what yellow eyes was up to.

Shrugging, Vyvyan took a swig of beer, and sighed. Glancing over at the angel, she said with clear and apparent honesty that, so long as she took yellow eyes with her, she could care less. She had no-one close to her, not really, only her mother and half-brother, and she’d only just met them, but Sam had Dean, so if it came to a choice, she’d save Sam over herself every time.

Cas didn’t reply, too lost in thought at this ….. heart breaking reply. He didn’t understand how anyone could choose NOT to fight for something as precious as life. So lost in thought was he that he didn’t notice Sam’s approach, until Sam laid a hand gently on his shoulder and he nearly jumped out of his skin. Turning to look up at Sam, they were both startled by a yell from close at hand.

 _ **YAHTZEE!**_ Shouted Vyvyan, smirking up at them from her place half way under the bed, the smirk falling from her features as she realised she was wedged in and couldn’t move. Dean rushed into the room in response to the yell, just as Sam and Cas lifted one end of the bed allowing Vyvyan to scramble free. As she climbed inelegantly to her feet again, she waved a folder of documents at them, a folder that had been wedged into the bottom of the bed frame, a place where Lauren and Vyvyan had often left important, secret information and messages for one another.

Flopping down onto the bed, Vyvyan sent Dean to get the other four cold beers from the camper as she, Sam and Cas began the boring job of skimming through the new information for the important parts. Dean also grabbed a paper when he came back with the beer. They all sat around swigging beer and reading text from dusty old manuscripts and documents. Sighing heavily, she reached for a fifth when Castiel suddenly spoke.

_”I think I’ve found something. Listen to this…  
My hair is Nu; my face is Ra; my eyes are Hathor; my ears are Wepwawet; my nose is She who presides over her lotus leaf; my lips are Anubis; my molars are Selkis; my incisors are Isis the goddess; my arms are the Ram, the Lord of mendes; my breast is Neith, Lady of Sais; my back is Seth; my phallus is Osiris; my muscles are the Lords of Kheraha; my chest is he who is greatly majestic; my belly and my spine are Sekhmet; my buttocks are the Eye of Horus; my thighs and my calves are Nut; my feet are Ptah; my toes are living falcons; there is no member of mine devoid of a god, and Thoth is the protection of all my flesh.  
—Book of the Dead, spell 42[25]_

Three spells / rituals were also listed there, each one sounding both confusing and riddle-like. _‘To purify the blood taint, you must start with a part of the tainter, add to that a measure of restless spirit and a jewel of the sea, some purity and blood of the one to be cleansed. The fire burns brightest at moons lowest point, then steep it until the moons weak again.’_

_‘To retake possession of the whole heart of the innocent, the guilty in the case must stand by. Then smelt down silver of true loves pain, adding into it some demon’s stain, mix with the purest of faith and belief, this is both soft and freely given. Now form into weapon heads and mark with you sign, these then fire into the wicked one goes.’_

_To find the perpetrator, and solve these cases, three things you must do in good time. You must trace out the path from the past on forward, and then return again. Then with black and red candles, summon up the one, and guide you through it this paper will. But be certain to finish this once you begin, for leaving mid-way you’ll regret, only the demons get stronger by suffering, humans, lest they’re crazy, go mad.’_

As Castiel’s gravely, warm and reassuring voice filled the cabin with it’s rich, comforting timbre, Vyvyan sat up and watched as the holy man read from the dusty paper as though reading from the word of god itself. With a gentle sigh, she dozed off, it had been a long, tough week.   
As Vyvyan and Sam started to try to figure out what the spells called for, Dean and Cas made a trip to the store and then began to quietly catalogue the things in the cabin, including an extensive collection of weaponry that was large enough to empower a small war. Weapons from all ages and races were there in numbers, to Cas’s shock there was even a couple of heavenly weapons that had ‘disappeared’ during the last heavenly war, he’d thought Balthazar had them all.

Dean was putting into a box anything that looked runic, or carried unfamiliar symbols for the nerdier members of the group to try to discover the purpose of. Sam and Vyvyan, an hour into the task, had so far figured out one of the spells ingredients, and the somewhat basic instructions given. It ran:-  
To purify those whose blood is tainted with evil,  
You need a portion of the evil one that tainted them, So, some hair or blood of the demon in question.  
Add some wormwood, being the sign of a restless spirit,  
A pearl, the jewel of the sea,  
Some salt, the purest substance known to man,  
And some blood of the person to be cleansed.  
Burn when the moon is at its waning quarter,  
Then brew until the moon is at it’s waning quarter again.

It hadn’t taken long, because all of the instructions and ingredients for that one had been fairly simple and relatively frequently referred to in hunting parlance. Grabbing a snack, they started into the next one. This one would be more problematic.  
To re-purify the former innocent made evil against their will,  
The one that made them evil must stand by and watch proceedings. That meant yellow eyes had to watch as they cleansed Sy.  
Melt the silver rings owned by loved ones lost or dead, being the silver of true loves pain.  
Add to it some sulphur, the traces of demonic presence,  
Mix in some of the purest faith and belief, being soft and freely given, most likely would be an angel’s feather.   
This, all smelted together, then formed into bullets or arrow heads, marked with the symbol of the victim and shot into the guilty, would kill the perpetrator, and cleanse the stain from the innocent.

Pleased with themselves, the two took a break and went to see how the others were doing, Vyvyan looking with interest at the box of objects that Dean had put together. Then she exclaimed when a realisation struck her. The males looked at her with concern, wondering what was wrong. Vyvyan looked at them with a startled expression on her rapidly paling face.  
Cas, the one standing closest to her at the time, put a hand on her shoulder by way of comfort as Dean and Sam asked what was the matter. Looking into the box, then back up at the males around her, she struggled to form sentences that could explain what she’d just discovered.

Picking up a map, and sticking it to the wall, she took a ball of string, some scissors and pins, and pinned each item, on string, to the wall, the other end of the string placed on the map indicating where it had come from, in order of when the case had been worked, and how it related to the third part of the document that she and Sam were decoding.

Lauren must have travelled to each place after Vyvyan left, collecting a memento of the hunt, each with a different symbol or sigil on, the pattern, though not obvious as she’d worked the cases, was clear to see with the building of the layers on the map. Didn’t the clue say find the path from the past to the future and back? The only case that was on it’s own in a town was in Futura, after that, they started to double back on where they’d been before.

Marking out the last of the cases that Lauren had collected things from, Vyvyan found that it was just three hunts ago, about six weeks before Lauren died. Putting those in as well, in a different colour, it was startling to see yet another pattern emerging. 

They marked three of the compass points within the spiral of cases already on the map. Taking an educated guess, the hunters decided that it probably meant that yellow eyes was planning a hit on the place marking the forth compass point in the ring. Time to get ahead of the game.

Stocking both baby and precious with new supplies from the seemingly bottomless amounts at the cabin, the four made their plans, and settled on leaving the next morning. That’s when Cas made a discovery. He’d been looking at the map, and had noticed something everyone else had missed. The café that Sy and Robert had been kidnapped from was dead centre of things.

Next morning, Vyvyan left with Cas riding shotgun, and Dean and Sam following behind. After a brief stop in the town to stock up for the trip and have breakfast and they were off. Going cross country to their destination, they arrived in only a day and a half, and set up camp at a motel, giving the Winchesters a chance to have a proper bed again.

 

When they left the motel, they split up into pairs, Dean and Vyvyan, Sam and Cas, and went to scout likely sites for the next demon infested event – what they found was a surprise. Sam and Cas, walking along one of the side streets in an industrial estate on the east side of town, came to a cluster of small warehouses that were run-down, slates fallen from the roofs, windows smashed in and debris scattered all around, generally in poor condition.  
When they got closer, demon’s opened fire on them from both floors, and angel-proofing could be seen on every surface. Sam called Dean. Meanwhile, in a cul-de-sac on the southern suburbs of the town, a small derelict house had caught Vyvyan’s attention, there was nothing on the outside to indicate anything untoward was going on inside, but there was an aura of evil coming off of the place, the whole area felt……chill.

While Dean spoke to Sam on the phone, Vyvyan took a closer look at the house, creeping up to peer in the windows, and sniff at the air, the smell of sulphur hanging like a cloud over the whole house. Gagging, she crept away. Getting back to Dean, and telling him of the heavy sulphur smell over the house, he was torn as to which they should investigate first.

Talking it over with Vyvyan about the warehouse that Sam and Cas had found, they decided to concentrate on the warehouse first, then come back to the house once they knew what was happening at the warehouse. That decided, they went back and met up with the others.

Going into the warehouse, the first move was obviously to get the angel-proofing off so Cas could come in, cautiously, the three went in, each heading in a different direction to get it done faster. Dean took a knife in the arm in the attempt, but they managed, and Cas joined them straight after, then they made their careful way into the basement of the warehouse, and the trap that awaited them.

Vyvyan’s mother and half-brother were sitting, tied to chairs and gagged, surrounded by trip-lines and explosives, Cas flew in and got them out one at a time, that’s when the trouble came. As he was landing with the second one, a pressure sensor, under the chairs, went off, detonating the explosives and bringing down part of the roof on them. Cas managed to get them all away. But not very far as he’d been weakened by all the sigils and symbols around the building.

Trying to leave was another headache, getting in had been a walk in the park compared to getting out. All six of them fighting non-stop against a hoard of demons hungry for blood. Cas took a blade to the chest, near his arm, incapacitating him greatly. The battle seemed impossible, but, with some luck and sheer blind determination, they all got out.

Heading back to the motel to clean up and patch up the wounds, Vyvyan had her family in precious while Cas and Sam travelling in baby with Dean, Sam driving. On the way, Vyvyan stopped off at a supermarket and a herbalist, buying in certain plants and extracts, much to her family’s puzzlement, but she’d learned a lot about herbal treatments from her chemist adoptive mum, and usually avoided over the counter remedies if she could.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After closing in on the demon's trail, Vyvyan traces her family, with the help of the brothers Winchester, and a certain trench coated Angel. What happens after?

When they got back to the motel, and went inside, it was clear to see that Castiel’s injury was significantly slower than usual in healing, probably due to his prolonged exposure to the draining effects of all the sigils in the warehouse. 

While Sam took care of stitching up Dean’s cut arm, and seeing to the other minor injuries on Sy and Robert, Vyvyan, with a small smile on her face, disappeared into the kitchen corner and began muttering to herself as she mixed various herbs and essences in honey or ground them with a mortar in salt. 

Curious, Cas came to sit at the kitchen table, overseeing what she was doing. Able to hear better, now he was closer and away from the chatter and harsh breathing of the others, he detected that, the words Vyvyan spoke were, or seemed to be, a spell, one that, presumably worked with the simple herbs and essential oils she was blending into honey, or grinding into salt.

As he watched, Vyvyan got out a large bowl, and into it tore sage, thyme, feverfew and lavender, before adding arnica and honey, then thoroughly mixing and beating hard, to produce a sticky green substance that had quite a powerful smell to it.

Then she grabbed a big pestle and mortar, putting in devils claw, holy basil, eucalyptus, agrimony, aloe and st johns wort, and grinding it into some sea salt and olive oil. Finally, she put the kettle on to heat while bruising valerian, green tea, capsicum, ginger and vervain, and steeping them in the boiling water.

Confused as to what she was doing, Cas was just about to ask, when Vyvyan turned to face them all as asked if Sam had bandaged Dean yet, when he said no, she was pleased, and told him to bring the dressing to her. When he did, she spread some of the sticky green stuff on it, then placed it gently but firmly on Dean’s injured arm, which had him wrinkling his nose at the smell.

Turning, Vyvyan then told Cas to take his coat and shirt off, spreading another dressing with the remains of the green paste, then putting it onto Cas’s cut on his chest and binding it on. Turning to the others, she had them sit down too, and show any minor injuries that they had, from scratches and bruises to minor cuts and grazes, she wanted everything treated.

When everyone was sitting around with their smaller injuries on display, Vyvyan picked up the mortar and went to each in turn, having them rub each gently with some of the oil based lotion, which, because of the herbs in it, was also green. It though, had a much milder, more pleasant aroma than the poultice had done.

Finished with the lotion, which she carefully bottled and refrigerated, she poured the liquid, now pleasantly warm, into six cups and handed them around for everyone to drink. The herbal tea, or tisane, was more to help build up immune systems and protect against infections than to do much else. Knowing that there was still the house to go to, Vyvyan wanted everyone as fit as they could be in the time they’d got.

Sy came to ask what she’d been doing, how the plants would help them, so Vyvyan explained about how her adoptive mother had been a chemist, but one that favoured the natural use of plant husbandry and extracts over chemicals that had, by and large, far more side effects, she’d just been giving mother nature a boost and therefore improving their chances on the mission to the house the next day.

As Cas opened his mouth to speak, Vyvyan beat him to it, saying that she’d treated him as well as his grace had been weakened by the markings on the warehouse walls, and that the dressings and so on would help until he recovered on his own. Castiel nodded and they all sat in silence for a short while, until the sound of stomachs gurgling and rumbling could be heard. Grinning, Vyvyan stood and headed for the door, Sam hard on her heels.

Hopping into precious, the two made their way to the town centre, stopping to get more dressings and bandages on the way, they then went to a supermarket and filled a trolley with toiletries and various necessities, like beer, soda, food and toilet paper, before heading to a take-away for burgers, fries and salads all round. They even got a couple family sized fruit and chocolate pies. And a crate of fresh fruit. Satisfied they had all they needed, they returned to the motel.

When they went in, having called for Sy and Robert to lend a hand with unloading, (leaving the pies in precious as a tease to Dean), they handed out the hot food, and were met with Dean’s strident _”Where’s the pie!?!”_ Smirking briefly at one another, they turned innocent faces to Dean and disclaimed all knowledge of his wanting any. One mega-pout arrived, without delay, on the older Winchester’s face. 

Once the burgers, fries and salads had been eaten (Dean co-opted into it, with a promise of a reward if he ate it all), Vyvyan disappeared out to precious again, and, three minutes late, the door was opened to her knock by a rapturously grinning Sam, who, with Vyvyan, promptly went off into gales of laughter at the bitchface thrown at them by Dean on seeing the pies and realising he’d been had.

With everyone sated food wise, and relaxed with having had a couple beers or a shot of Jack, they talked over what had happened to Sy and Robert while they were gone, and how they’d worked out where to look for yellow eyes, and the spells that might free Sy and Vyvyan herself from his blood taint. With teary eyes, Sy looked at her oldest child, and saw bitter determination and aggressive surety of her plans. Unable to find a counter argument, she and Robert agreed to go along with it.

Next morning, they all, the six of them, went to the sulphur scented house, and went tooled up, with enough equipment to start a riot, and made their cautious way into the dim, musty interior of the two level home. Spreading out and keeping eye contact wasn’t too difficult given the size of the dwelling, the main problem came when they came to a door to the attic, so well sealed it seemed impermeable. Robert and Sy managed though.

Inside, the dusty atmosphere was even heavier with the stench of sulphur than downstairs had been, and the sound of movement could be heard. Sam and Robert, sidled up towards the sound while Vyvyan and Sy, moving in sync with one another, went up the other side, Dean and Cas taking the central passage. The dim light making it hard to see anyone hiding in the darkened corners.

Rounding a pile of debris on the floor if the attic, Cas, turning towards Vyvyan and Sy, came face to face with the yellow eyed demon, partially pinned under the fallen chimney wall, knowing that he was needed alive, he called to Dean, who’d moved off to where Sam and Robert where battling two demons themselves.

Just as he called, Vyvyan came round the corner, saw who he’d cornered, and whipped a pair of demon proof cuffs out of her pocket, snapped them on his wrists, and using another two pairs, cuffed him also to herself and Cas. That’s when three more appeared from nowhere, and attacked from behind. Luckily, Sy chose that moment to round the corner, and knifed one, while Cas smote another, and Robert, finally catching up to them, got the third.

Back downstairs, and they had the yellow eyed demon shackled to the kitchen fixtures, unable to move, Sam and Cas saw to lighting the room, and while Sy, Robert and Dean looked on, Vyvyan, beaming grin spreading out across her features, got a selection of wickedly sharp, and viciously shaped throwing knives. Smirking as the demon started to mouth off about how she couldn’t do anything to it. Little did it know.

An evil, cold smile on her face, Vyvyan started to talk to her family, watching the demon listening in, knowing it was trapped. _”Did you know, mother, that while I was at school, I was training in the circus? I learned how to be their knife thrower. That’s where I met Lauren, she was one of their gymnasts.”_ As she spoke, she idly, without even looking, threw a knife at the wall toward the demon.

 _”If you think I missed with that, think again. I’m just getting warmed up. What’s the big plan for Sam and I, and others like us?”_ Another carelessly thrown knife, this one lands embedded in the wall, pinning his left thigh in place. The first had landed beside his wrist. _”Mmmm? What’s the plan? Need more persuasion? Okay.”_ Another silver dagger went flying at him, this one pinned his right shoulder to the wall.

Dean, in an aside to anyone listening, murmured to remind him not to piss her off. A forth blade went sailing across the kitchen and into the wall, this one landing beside the demons ear, his head turned, almost going cross-eyed as he sought to see where it had landed. _”You know, I’ve dozens of these, and patience is one of my virtues, I think. I can keep this up all night. You will answer, eventually.”_

A fifth knife went cartwheeling through the air and hit the wall, bracketing the demons head from the other side. _Chatting to the people around her, not even looking at how or where she threw them, the sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth knives hit the wall, snagging his jeans and shirt sleeves to the wall, pulling him tighter in. _”You feeling talkative yet?_ The tenth blade caught the crotch of his jeans and held him, motionless, the slightest downward pressure now would surely cut into his demonic jewels._

_A croaked sound came from yellow eyes as she picked up an eleventh blade, Sam and Dean snorting with laughter over how nonchalantly Vyvyan was dealing with the sulphur sucking scum. Robert, eyes open wide, gazed at his newly discovered sister with something akin to hero-worship in his eyes, while Sy looked on with both pride, and dismay. Cas remained, as usual, blank faced._

_Picking her nails with the tip of the next knife while she asked her mother about her father, when the demon started to giggle, it was launched at him, over Vyvyan’s shoulder, and landed marking his ankle. Then a thought struck, and Vyvyan fished something out of her bag. It was a large, sharp ring, something like the size of a dinner plate, but empty in the middle, the centre gone, just the outer band, sharpened all the way round. She grinned as she held it up for all to see._

__”Mmmmm. Anyone know what this thing is? I’ve not seen one before, I picked it up at Lauren’s place. Looks like it’ll throw like a Frisbee, shall I try?”_ Before anyone could answer, she launched that, too, at yellow eyes head, it burying itself almost half it’s circumference into the wall, fitting the demons head like a halo. The brothers snorted derisively while Cas coughed into his hand and her mother and brother sighed._

__”Vyvyan, that’s a chakram, not a toy. You could have taken his head off with that if you’d missed._ Rubbing a hand thoughtfully over her chin, Vyvyan nodded, _”Okay mother, you’re right. I’ll just stick to what I know best._ With that she launched four more knives in swift succession._

_Evidently, the demon was getting a little uncomfortable now, and Vyvyan turned up the heat, dipping the knives into holy water and salt before throwing them, this time aiming to hit skin. Screams started echoing through the semi derelict house as the demon was sliced with precision by the flying blades. Taking a break to have a beer, Vyvyan looked at the demon, an expression of loathing on her otherwise sweet face as it gasped in pain._

_Walking over to it, a bottle of salted holy water in her hands, she took a mouthful and spat it into the demons face, before calling for Sam to take the blood needed for the rituals they’d be doing, Robert and Dean going into the back yard to build themselves a smelter._

_In the kitchen, Sam had the goods from precious spread out and was setting about mixing up the necessary concoction for Vyvyan to burn at the next quarter moon, two days time, then, carefully jarred and sealed, he put it into her bag before restarting with the mix for Sy._

_While the two men were firing up the smelter and getting it up to heat, Sam took the four rings they’d managed to collect together, all from widows or broken engagements, all pure silver. With those, he placed the sulphur they’d collected at the warehouse, looked pleadingly at Cas, who reached behind himself and then held out a feather, then concentrated on setting up the bullet mould for the .45 magnum that Vyvyan had brought with her for the purpose._

_As evening fell, the men came in, sweaty and hot looking, with a small container of molten silver, which they poured with studious concentration into the bullet moulds. It made three, and they glowed with a faint light, echoing the gleam of Castiel’s grace. As soon as they were cool enough, had Sy’s mark engraved on them and had been loaded with the necessary gun powder, they were placed into the gun and, with a smile, Vyvyan handed it over to Sy, who, without hesitation, pulled the trigger._

_The demon, slumping forward on the knives that were all that held him up, gave one last, breathy gasp, and died. With Robert and Sam holding him up, Vyvyan was collecting her knives when suddenly ANOTHER demon appeared. This one also had yellow eyes, and yelled angrily _”THAT WAS MY BROTHER YOU BITCH!”_ Vyvyan, throwing the knife she’d just pulled from the wall over her shoulder, caught him on his cheek, and he vanished._

_Looking at one another, they collected the rest of their gear up together, and retreated back to the motel, baby and precious making short work of the trip. During the evening, while they were sorting and packing all their belongings, trying to figure who’s was who’s, they discussed the second yellow eyed demon, who Sam recognised from a vision he’d had._

_Next morning, as they split into the two vehicles, Cas threw a spanner in the works, by deciding he wanted to stay with Vyvyan until her own ritual was completed, the next evening. Resignedly, Dean agreed to give Sy and Robert a lift to their home town while Cas and Vyvyan went straight back to the cabin._

_Back at the cabin, Cas and Vyvyan were in for a shock – the place had been overturned. The furniture was torn up, maps and pictures ripped off the walls, china smashed and metal dented, someone had been very thorough. With a small chill, Vyvyan ran into the bathroom, pulled off the bath side, and wrenched open the plumbing, breathing a deep sigh of relief when she found a small package wedged tightly inside the bath down pipe._

_Pulling it out as though it was the most fragile of Dresden china, and unwrapping it with precise, careful movements, she brought into view a long, narrow knife. An unusual one though, this one was hollow for filling with a substance that was poison to whatever you were hunting. Be it dead man’s blood, salt, or whatever._

_In the midst of the chaos of her cabin, Vyvyan still remembered the Winchester’s, and how they still had to deal with their demon. Spotting something in the ruins of the inside of the cabin, Vyvyan held it out to Cas, for him to give the brothers when he next saw them, it was a compass, one that pointed to the location, if local, of a demons presence._

_That night, at midnight, the two stood beneath the quarter moon and burnt the blend for the start of Vyvyan’s purification ritual. Then, after Vyvyan slept, they worked on tidying up the cabin. It took a week, but between them, when Cas wasn’t busy elsewhere, they got it done, and Castiel put up advanced wardings against all demon kind._


End file.
